


Twelve O Clock on a Tuesday, 1935

by Tandirra



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Idiots in Love, M/M, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-27
Updated: 2019-06-27
Packaged: 2020-05-20 20:42:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,350
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19384306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tandirra/pseuds/Tandirra
Summary: Aziraphale wakes up in the morning to find a rather drunk, rather miserable Crowley in his bookshop.





	Twelve O Clock on a Tuesday, 1935

It was just barely eight o'clock in the morning by Aziaraphale’s reckoning when he found Crowley lounging on his favorite love seat, surrounded by scores of empty liquor bottles. 

He had one in his hand too, half drunk. Considerably less drunk than the demon, who struggled to sit upright as he lighted upon Aziraphale coming down the staircase. “Ah- ah, there you are!  _ Angel…  _ I wuh- beginning to wonder…” His glasses were scattered somewhere in the mess he’d made. His pupils were blown wide in the dim light, not that the alcohol helped. His Palm Beach suit (as he’d been obnoxiously persistent to namedrop last time they’d met) jacket was propped behind him like a pillow and his vest was unbuttoned rather hastily. His usually slicked hair was messy from hands run through it. He looked downright miserable.

The sight made something in Aziraphale’s chest ache as he picked across the mess his friend had made. “Do you even know what time it is?” Was what he said, though not what he wished to say. When Crowley only grunted, taking another swig of whiskey, some of which dribbled down his chin. Aziraphale sighed. “I was asleep.”

_ “Asleep?!”  _ Crowley’s swung his arms with his exclamation and slung whiskey across a stack of Wordsworth poems, though they had the good sense not to stain. “Why? We don’t need to  _ sleep.”  _ His bottle tipped dangerously as he swayed, it seemed that sitting upright was quite the arduous task.

Aziraphale intercepted before any further parts of his collection were threatened. He snatched the bottle out of the demon’s loose grip and earned a small “Hey!” for it but nothing more. “Crowley, we both sleep. If I’m not mistaken you slept through a century.”

Finally tipping over, Crowley looked up at him and his yellow eyes, distant and unfocused as they were, seemed to glow. “Yeah…yeah, but that’s  _ different-  _ I needed you and you were- were asleep...”

“You ne-” Aziraphale swallowed hard and straightened his posture. “You should sober up.”

“Not. Happening.” Crowley shook his head into the plush cushions, only further ruining his hair, which stuck up at odd angles, made stiff and wet looking by whatever new oil Crowley had run through it. “I like it this way. Yeah, yeah I  _ like  _ it.” He grabbed again for the bottle Aziraphale held out of reach but it was a halfhearted attempt and he quickly gave up, collapsing in on himself and curling up, as if he were once again a snake and could wind into a tight, safe bundle.

His coiling gave Aziraphale room to sit on the love seat beside him, a space which he promptly, after putting Crowley’s whiskey far out of reach, occupied. “Then at least tell me why you’ve decided to create a disturbance in my shop at eight in the morning when I should be enjoying a scrumptious egg breakfast.” Though he softened his tone moments later when Crowley kept his face squarely hidden in the red velvet. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

Muffled by the couch came “I was sent to America.”

“Ah, I understand. Yes, things are going rather badly over there as well, aren’t they?” England was certainly feeling the effects of what the humans were calling a global economic downturn and he’d heard horror stories about America. But Crowley getting so upset about that, it didn’t seem right. 

By some miracle, which, of course, that was exactly what it was, Aziraphale never seemed to need to worry about such frivolous minutiae as human currency. He knew Crowley was the same.

His words seemed to incense Crowley, who hauled himself up again and gave him a bleary glare. “No! No- nuh- you don’t. You don’t.” Slumping, Crowley stared listlessly up at the balcony above them and visibly struggled to string together a thought. “I went- Lord Beel- belz-b-bebe bub sent me to a… hosspital.” He was slipping. Aziraphale put a tentative steadying hand on his shoulder, which he gazed at for a long moment. “To check out- to check. One of Pesstilence’s lasst- last  _ whoopees!  _ Over there.”

“Oh…” So that was it. They’d both seen more than their fair share of Pestilence and what they caused but such awful sights never got any easier to bear.

“I wish it wassn’t me. Why didn’t- didn’t they send ssomeone elsse?  _ Why? _ It’s not fair. I hate.  _ Hate _ that stuff.” Crowley slipped further until he lay his head in Aziraphale’s lap, continuing to mutter, having slipped fully into incoherence.

Suddenly, Aziraphales ears were ringing. In his pondering of the phenomenon he momentarily lost his place in their conversation. Whatever was in Crowley’s hair, it smelled rather nice Aziraphale had to admit, though it barely masked the reek of alcohol. And while he seemed rather dense, Crowley’s head on his lap was hardly a weight at all and, in fact, felt intimately familiar like the pleasant weight of an old and well loved blanket such as the kind he had spread across his bed upstairs.

“Ah- Azira- zira?” Crowley was speaking clearly again, or clearer, and he was looking directly up at Aziraphale. “D’you hear me?”

“I’m- sorry.” He stumbled, remembering himself. After all Crowley was just drunk, of course he couldn’t hold himself up. It was a wonder he didn’t slither into a ball on the ground at this point. “Come again?”

“You ever… sseen it?”

Aziraphale cocked his head. “Seen what?”

“Polio.” Crowley’s eyes darted, though nothing they settled on they stayed content with for long. Finally he settled on his wringing hands. “Nasty. Nassty… Awful.”

“Not in a hospital, no.” But he’d heard enough stories and seen the after-effects on children and adults alike for more than a century. Their human frames, usually so malleable and resilient, able to overcome near anything, reduced and withered in ways they’d not yet learned how to heal. 

“Horrible. ‘Ss horrible. The kids. The  _ kids _ . Angel, it’s not fair.”

He sounded so horribly despondent. Aziraphale, uncertain what else to do, hesitantly tried at stroking Crowley’s hair. It was hard and slightly sticky and Aziraphale drew back, feeling equally off-put and hotly embarrassed. What was he thinking? Crowley was a demon and demons were evil creatures of hate and fear, they wouldn’t like to be  _ pet _ .

Except that Crowley didn’t look an awful lot like a demon right now. And he did seem to have noticed Aziraphale’s attempt, as he had, at the touch, relaxed ever so slightly. Now, though, all the tension flooded back and he spoke in a low, almost monotone voice. As if feeling took too much energy he didn’t have to spare. “You seen. Pictures? Pictures of- what do they call them? The- the things they put people in. In. Big bloody contraptionss. Whole rooms full of them. And humans. Stuffed in them like- like. Can’t move.” He visibly shivered. “Hell on Earth.”

And he should know. “Iron Lungs.” Aziraphale supplied. He remembered the images of it in the paper when the Americans had invented it not too many years ago now. He’d thought it looked ghastly. But if it did good… well, then, it couldn’t be as bad as it looked.

“Yeah. Yeah, that’s it. Awful…” Again Crowley lapsed into a discontented silence.

Aziraphale settled a hand on the nape of Crowley’s neck and realized the gunk had disappeared from Crowley’s hair. Not by his doing, certainly.

He dared not bring it up. “I’m sorry you had to see that, dear.” Ever so tentatively he tried at stroking Crowley’s hair again, barely a touch, as if he feared Crowley would reach up and strike him with venomous fangs. Which, for all Aziraphale knew, he could.

But he didn’t; all Crowley did was sink further into the couch and into him. And for what felt like a few minutes, though maybe it was far longer for somewhere distant Aziraphale heard his grandfather clock chime out nine notes, they sat together on the couch in silence.

This was better than Crowley drinking, Aziraphale reckoned.

“Why can’t your lot fix it?” Crowley finally asked, sounding slightly more composed but now markedly resentful.

Aziraphale bit his tongue. “We are not to interfere—”

“Bull! You could, though. Couldn’t you?” Crowley shifted to accuse him, staring up at him with luminous yellow eyes that were brimming with a certain brand of wrath.

“If that were part of the plan.” Aziraphale offered, though felt rather weak about it. “But God works in —”

“Don’t ssay it.” The look Crowley gave him before returning to staring at the ceiling was in no small part withering.

“Well, it’s true!” He tried at defending himself and God, though She need not be defended She could do it perfectly well on her own should She so wish. He hoped She wouldn’t, of course, that would be an Almighty smiting that he believed Crowley didn’t deserve. And though he realized that line of thinking was incorrect, after all Crowley  _ was  _ a demon, he couldn’t quite shake it. “Why did they send you? It doesn’t seem much like your business if it’s Pestilence’s work.”

“They like me.” Crowley made a disgusted face. “Well, my Boss does.”

“Because of all you took credit for?” Aziraphale felt the need to point it out. “Perhaps if you didn’t embellish so much you’d be less of a commodity.” He didn’t try to hide the pointedness of his remark, much as he did sympathize. Crowley always had a flair for the dramatic but he really needed to show some restraint when speaking with his Superiors.

Crowley shot him a look, though it didn’t last long because he seemed to have trouble meeting Aziraphale’s eye. “Ssure. Crucify me, will you?”

“I wouldn’t.” Aziraphale assured.

Crowley just sighed. “Word around Downstairs is that Pestilence is retiring. Humans are getting too… too clever for him with their… what are they called. V- something. Vaccines?”

That was information Head Office would like to know and it alarmed. Not the vaccine part, they hadn’t bothered to care when the humans had managed to quell the White Plague with their sciences, they likely would continue to show little interest in the future. “So, what, there will be  _ three  _ horsemen now? Doesn’t have the same ring to it.” He wasn’t exactly sure how he could tell Head Office about it, though. Not without some concocted lie about spying on Crowley’s nefarious and most certainly evil conversations.

He had to wonder how many times they would fall for that fairly weak lie of his. 

But Crowley just shook his head. “Nah. Something new is brewing. Or has been? Listen I don’t really- I try not to pay attention and the horsemen are the humans own creations anyway, not ours.”

“Except for Death.”

“Yes, him excluded. Obviously.” Crowley rolled his eyes and they really nearly rolled back into his head.

Aziraphale looked down on him until he looked properly sheepish. “Don’t look at me like that, angel. They sent me- why was it again…” Crowley considered himself for a long moment, clearly scouring his still foggy mind. “Oh. To make sure it was all going smoothly. Which, it was. He- Pestilence- he outsmarted their medicine. They got the vaccine wrong. Now they’re dying or- or everything else nasty that happens with the damn plague. Pestilence’s lasst big hurrah before he- he hands over the reigns to the new guy.”

“Humans are clever, they’ll get it right eventually. And then everything will be alright.” That last part reeked distinctly of a lie. If he knew one thing about Earth, and, at this point, he liked to think he knew quite a bit about Earth, it was that very rarely were things ‘alright’ for very long. If the humans didn’t create their next big disaster it would come by some other means.

There was always another disaster just around the corner. With God testing them and all that. Aziraphale couldn't afford to think about fairness the way Crowley could, though even he was surprised each time the world got just that little bit worse.

Crowley, of course, knew it was a lie too but he didn’t comment, only lay motionless, his head still in Aziraphale’s lap. “I just- don’t like it when the kids get involved. Seems unfair. Do you know how many of them I saw in those machines? Or half withered away? Or- or. Dying. Or dying.” He drew his hands up to his face and while one covered his eyes the other scratched listlessly at the fabric near Aziraphale’s knee.

“I’m sorry.” Aziraphale repeated

“Nn- I’m not the one dying of polio.”

“I’m glad.” The sentiment slipped out and Aziraphale felt himself go red. Crowley stiffened. “ _ Er- _ so you won’t have to go through the paperwork. Messy discorporations and such- you know how it is.”

Crowley rose to sit beside him. And Aziraphale felt rather robbed of his weight, though he wasn’t sure why exactly. It was surely a ridiculous thought. “Yes. Of course.” He was scanning the ground, for, Aziraphale realized, his sunglasses. And made to stand. “I should be—” But as he let go of the couch he wobbled dangerously and gave a low groan, looking seconds from collapsing entirely. “Oh, I’m gonna be sick.”

Alarmed, Aziraphale stood and steadied him, taking careful hold of his shoulders. “Don’t! Please, don’t. You can sleep it off on the couch if you need to. Or… or you could sober up.” 

Were Aziraphale not steadying Crowley would have certainly collapsed. Still, he muttered “Who said I wanted to?” Which made Aziraphale’s stomach plunge.

He’d thought their talk had helped. He’d  _ hoped _ .

Crowley was staring at Aziraphale’s hand fixed on his shoulder with an unreadable expression but Aziraphale did not move it. “Please, my dear, you mustn't.” He let a note of pleading enter his voice. For some reason he feared if Crowley left his shop now it would be years before he came back.

And that, losing Crowley, he knew he feared.

For a handful of seconds more Crowley watched Aziraphale’s hand. Then his eyes flitted up to meet Aziraphale’s own. Beneath the dull haze of alcohol there was something bright as fire in them and it sparked some fluttering, familiar warmth in Aziraphale’s chest and he swore for just a moment Crowley leaned in closer but quick as he looked Crowley’s gaze turned to the couch and the feeling faded back into obscurity, not to be grasped.

Even when it was gone it left Aziraphale slightly breathless. 

“Sure…” Crowley murmured. “Sure, angel.” He took one step and tumbled onto the crimson cushions rather ungracefully. He rearranged himself with slightly shocking speed, giving a space where Aziraphale sat down beside him. “You can’t hate me if I throw up on your books. I th- I warned you.”

“I’d rather you didn’t but if you  _ must,  _ I suppose it would take a proper miracle to get them clean again.” Crowley glanced briefly and wearily at him with some exasperation. To make sure he got the point Aziraphale helpfully winked.

Crowley groaned.

Aziraphale watched his friend fidget with the buttons on his vest. “Did you see  _ anything  _ nice in America?”

“Well…” Crowley leaned on his shoulder. Even though Crowley had vanished the oil in his hair Aziraphale could still smell it and it gave him a heady rush. “Had a fine enough time in New York. Good scene over there, and lots of cars.”

“That’s good!” Aziraphale encouraged. Even during hardship human culture tended to flourish. It was an encouraging aspect of their species, one he’d taken a particular shine too.

“Slashed some tires. Caused a nice bit of mayhem by delaying the subway system for a few minutes.” Here was the first smile he’d seen from Crowley for the day. “It’s amazing what a minute or two here and there can do to a human’s busy schedule. Especially when there’s six million of them.”

“Sounds nice.” Aziraphale nodded, encouraged in his own right by Crowley’s change in mood. Such relatively harmless mayhem was far closer to what Crowley enjoyed.

The mood didn’t last long, though, as Crowley’s weight on his shoulder grew heavier. He appeared a shade paler than he should have been.

Aziraphale briefly pondered to what extent his collection would get ruined by a sudden sickness but, while it was a seamless decision, he chewed considerably on his words before uttering them. “You can… lay down, if - if you need to.” The words came out small, barely more than a whisper. Any louder and the effort would have been too much to bear and they wouldn’t have come out at all. “If… if it’s comfortable.” He stammered out when Crowley didn’t speak. “Or- hah- I should just get up you can have the whole couch! Silly me!” He laughed, perhaps a bit lamely, and made to rise.

Crowley, still looking disconcertingly green, did pause for the briefest look, one that had innumerable age to it and that panged in Aziraphale’s chest, but said nothing as he sank into Aziraphale’s lap again. He let out another small, hissing sigh and relaxed. 

Aziraphale did his best to follow suit. Catching his breath, he sat up a bit straighter and thought, rather less proudly than he should have, he made a good show of it. He likely would have gotten commendations on his angelic poise.

Or maybe not. The only one who ever commented on his posture anymore was Crowley, who loved to poke fun. No angels seemed to care, despite the effort he put in to keep up appearances.

As Aziraphale contemplated that they slipped into silence and he again settled into running his hands through Crowley’s hair. At some point he noticed the constant rhythm of sleep to Crowley’s breathing.

He sat there, Crowley laying atop him, for a good while. He wasn’t sure how long nor was he counting as time seemed to lose all of its already nebulous meaning.

He did not pay much attention to the world at large, and little disturbed them save the occasional passerby stopping at the doors to his shop only to be turned away by finding them most solidly locked. At least, nothing interrupted this peace until the bells of his grandfather clock chimed to twelve. And Crowley, curled up, with his head still resting on Aziraphale’s lap, stirred.

He looked up at Aziraphale, yellow eyes hardly more than bleary slits. “Nnh- hello, angel.”

“Good morning- or afternoon, rather.” Aziraphale smiled down at his significantly hungover looking friend, though he couldn’t help but feel as if he’d lost a precious moment.

Wincing at the sound, Crowley rose to a sit and rose further after he discovered, or perhaps willed, his sunglasses to be in a convenient spot on the table beside them. He was, resolutely, not looking at Aziraphale. Which did sting. But at least he wasn’t wobbling any longer. “I… should be going.” He returned his clothes to a fine enough condition with a snap. “I- eh- apologize for having been a bother. I- uh- owe you breakfast.”

Aziraphale rose too. “It’s alright, you’re never a bother to me.” And perhaps that was a bit too honest because he followed it with “I- well, I’ll make sure you remember that breakfast promise.”

He couldn’t read Crowley’s expression but the demon still appeared caught entirely off guard. He stammered through a response. “Uh- yeah. Course. I’m not- you’d think I’d forget?” He turned rather stiffly on his heel and stalked towards the entrance. 

The knot that formed in Aziraphale’s stomach as he watched him go threatened to push into his throat and choke him.

With one hand on the handle, Crowley gave him one last glance. 

No words were said. None could measure up to what needed to be said.

And, as if the door wasn't locked at all, Crowley walked out. The bell on the door dinged.

Aziraphale felt quite as if he’d been punched squarely in the gut as silence settled over the bookstore which now, despite the obvious overflow of knowledge and voices it encapsulated in the books that surrounded him, felt awfully empty.

**Author's Note:**

> Vaccinate your kids! Thanks for reading!


End file.
